We Dance Around The Shul

Our Torah is old.

The blue velvet cover

And the silver plate that hangs over the velvet

Are both covered in names

Of donors long gone,

And their honored loved ones, gone even longer.

These names mean nothing to us:

We ignore them

On Shabbat

When we dance around the shul.

On Selichot we put aside the old velvet

And dressed our Torah in fresh white covers,  
only a year old,

Donated by a beloved member,

Amina.

She died this year, four days before Rosh HaShanah.

Tonight it’s Simkhat Torah.

So we now take off Amina’s white cover

And put on the old one,

Blue, embroidered with strangers' names. 

Then we will dance around the shul.

We will think of Amina every year at this time 

From now on 

Until none of us are around,

Until there is no one who remembers her, 

Or us.

Then others will carry this scroll with the white cover

Donated by a Jew they never knew,

While they dance around the shul.

We give thanks for the ancient traditions, 

Telling the story even when we can’t, 

Keeping our loved ones’ memories 

And giving us Torah from the beginning, every year.